DREADED

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does dreaded mean? 

• DREADED (adjective)
  The adjective DREADED has 1 sense:

1. causing fear or dread or terror

  Familiarity information: DREADED used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DREADED (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Causing fear or dread or terror

Synonyms:

awful; dire; direful; dread; dreaded; dreadful; fearful; fearsome; frightening; horrendous; horrific; terrible

Context example:

a terrible curse

Similar:

alarming (frightening because of an awareness of danger)

 Context examples 

I flung the warm shawl over her, and drew the edges tight round her neck, for I dreaded lest she should get some deadly chill from the night air, unclad as she was.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

It was what I remotely dreaded when I was first impelled to stay away from England.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

As yet I had not thought; I had only listened, watched, dreaded; now I regained the faculty of reflection.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

As we followed it north we began to encounter the dreaded sea-fogs.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

“PRIVATE: for the hands of G. J. Utterson ALONE, and in case of his predecease to be destroyed unread,” so it was emphatically superscribed; and the lawyer dreaded to behold the contents.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

It was a terrible world thought he, and it was hard to know which were the most to be dreaded, the knaves or the men of the law.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Presently I heard the sound of footsteps along the passage; the door opened, and the wretch whom I dreaded appeared.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Scientists were able to successfully remove a gene that caused Alzheimer's disease from the human brain, possibly paving the way for a new kind of treatment against the dreaded illness.

(Alzheimer's Disease Gene Successfully Removed From Human Brain, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The dreaded white god was not there.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Anne was to leave them on the morrow, an event which they all dreaded.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)